The 7 Habits of a Highly Successful Marriage OR … “Getting the Most from your Advertising Agency”
I recently did a talk for the Microsoft U.S. marketing team entitled “The 7 Habits of a Highly Successful Marriage OR … “Getting the Most from your Advertising Agency” (by Grad Conn, with apologies to the estate of Steven Covey). Here is a capsule version of the principles of working well with agencies … or better put — BEING A GREAT CLIENT:
Habit 1: Be Proactive
Demand a better relationship by being the first person to behave in the manner to which you want everyone to be accustomed. This does NOT mean you are a push-over. You should respect your agency like a family member – argue in private, defend in public.
Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind
Strategy matters – and should be your contribution to the agency partnership. Have clear, concise creative strategies, realistic pro-formas, and complete customer experience maps. Respect your agency by getting internal sign-offs on strategy, on approved comps, and on pre-pros. Don’t waste time by exposing complete work late in the process to first-time senior management review.
CREATIVE STRATEGY
The Benefit is not a list of product features, but rather the potential solution to a real business problem faced by customer. The benefit represents the promise to the customer – how the various product features improve the customer’s life or solve their problems. Ideally the benefit forges an emotional connections with the customer.
The Reason Why supports the Benefit statement – hopefully in plain, simple language. This is the functional reasons why this benefit will be believable, relevant and desirable to our target customer.
Brand Character: If you product was a person, how would you describe that person?
Habit 3: Put First Things First
The work. The work. The work. Make sure you are creative-weighted with your agency retainer – you should have a minimum ratio of 2:1, and preferably 4:1. Don’t be such a difficult client that the agency needs to staff up on account people to act as “client wranglers”. Inspire creativity – don’t do “line reads”. Encourage the agency to submit your work for awards – be a client people want to work on. Here’s a great visual on *bad* client behavior by Bo Zaunders:
Habit 4: Think Win-Win
Be the kind of client that makes the creatives working on your business want to think about your business in the shower. Stimulate break out thinking. Let your agency make money, so they worry about your business, and not their business. Remember Einstein’s quote: “Why is it I always get my best ideas while shaving?“
Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, Then to be Understood
Measure the work and aggressively pursue failure. 98% of all marketing fails – get it down to 95% and you’ll be a genius. Be a truth-teller on campaign effectiveness – too much is ‘working’ today. Conduct Quarterly Creative Reviews to understand what is positively and negatively impacting the business, and rapidly iterate with your agency.
Habit 6: Synergize
Combine the strengths of people through positive teamwork, so as to achieve goals no one person could have done alone. Make your agency relationship a partnership – have fun, work hard, and create magic together. Have lots of casual connections – dinners, drinks, hang out. These are the most interesting people you will ever meet…
Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw
Know your customers. Know your competitors. Understand communication and advertising by reading case studies and history. Don’t be a doctor who doesn’t read journals. Don’t be an uneducated practitioner. Chemists don’t re-invent the Periodic Table every time they do an experiment – they build off what has been proven in the past. But also — don’t get trapped by rules — but you need to know ’em to break ’em. Here’s a little more Bo Zaunders magic:
Optional Habit 8: Don’t be an ass
Assume that everything you write and say will be published on the front page of the New York Times. Most importantly – do unto others as you would have them do unto you. And remember, you are a representative of your company’s brand – treat people with respect and dignity, always. Amazing as it seems — this is the one habit that seems to elude people the most. I believe it comes from an attitude of “agency as servant”, versus the correct model of “agency as partner”.
So, in summary:
Habit 1: Be Proactive
Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind
Habit 3: Put First Things First
Habit 4: Think Win-Win
Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, Then to be Understood
Habit 6: Synergize
Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw
Optional Habit 8: Don’t be an ass